By Portia Sinnott, Zero Waste USA and Zero Waste Sonoma County
The California/Nevada Regional Conservation Committee (CNRCC) Zero Waste Committee supports the 13 California chapters and Sierra Club California in advocating for Zero Waste initiatives at the state and local level. To that end, the Committee asked Sonoma County (and Bay Area) based Zero Waste USA to implement a state-wide Train-the-Trainers program utilizing the fun, interactive Zero Waste Curious presentation that ZWUSA volunteers give in San Francisco and Alameda County. The development of these presentations were in part funded by a 2017-2018 Altamont Education Advisory Board grant underwritten by Altamont Landfill mitigation fees resulting from a lawsuit of which the San Francisco Bay Chapter was a party.
The emerging plan is to develop the series this Spring at the Sonoma Group offices and then give 20-minute talks all over the county. This summer we will start training Redwood, San Francisco Bay and San Diego chapter members to train others to talk Zero Waste. The planning team is looking for a host and presenter travel funding for a large mid-California training later this year. Next year some or most of the trainings may be done via webinars and conference calls.
The Sonoma County trainings are co-sponsored by Zero Waste Sonoma County in collaboration with 350Sonoma. Sonoma Group leaders Shirley Johnson and Theresa Ryan have been helping organize the series. Sixteen people have volunteered to date and more will join as the word gets out. The initial training includes four sessions - a program overview with sample presentation, a script reading via conference call, practice with a buddy and then a friends and family presentation. The next training series starts Wednesday, May 23 from 1-3pm including a friends and family presentation at 2pm. To join the team, please RSVP to zwsonoma@sonic.net. Drop-ins welcome at 2pm.
This effort is in concert with a large stakeholder collaborative initiated in July 2017 by the Sonoma County Local Task Force on Integrated Waste Management. Working over 9 months, the Sonoma County Zero Waste Task Force (ZWTF) prepared the 2018 Zero Waste Resolution Request for Sonoma County jurisdictions. To support this epic effort the ZWTF is working to create a groundswell of support for the Request by giving Zero Waste Curious? presentations in every town and city in the County. If you are willing to schedule a presentation with your group or in your town, please send an email to zwsonoma@sonic.net with contact information and presentation ideas.